THEC Tories offer no hope for young homeless STEVE FRENCH reports on the December 3 conference of the Campaign to Defend the Welfare State (CDWS) The CDWS Conference lacked any campaigning edge, though it showed it ability to attract important forces from the labour movement.
Over 200 attended, and platform speakers gave a thorough statistical analysis of the Tory offensive; but unfortunately no debate was allowed in the plenary sessions, and no speakers were called from the floor.
GMB union leader John Edmonds welcomed Labour's rediscovered call for full employment, and argued that 'concrete needs to be mixed in with the rhetoric' He advocated a major programme of public works, though neither he nor other platform speakers explained how this could take place without thwarting the Blair leadership's attempt to dump Clause Four, and the Gordon Brown's firm rejection of any commitment to increased public spending.
Morning Star editor Tony Chater called for 'action' to defend the welfare state, but was John Edmonds not specific. Former CP General Secretary Gordon MacLennon went further, and called for strike action to defend the welfare state.
Of course this raises wider issues. A week earlier at the 'Right to Strike' conference, Fire Brigades Union leader Ken. Cameron had talked of the 'need to strike to defend essential public services'.
Campaigning
Strikes are needed: but they can best be prepared as the product of a big, active campaign in the labour movement.
Socialist Outlook supporters won support in one of the workshops for calling a national demonstration this spring in defence of the welfare state.
Closing the conference, Ken Livingstone said that this proposal would be discussed by the officers and taken up with trade union leaders.
No new officers were elected, and this was less than a full-blooded campaign commitment. However it does offer an opportunity to press the CDWS to campaign actively rather than remain a talking shop.
Informally, conference organisers accepted the need to move the CDWS up a few gears. We must try to ensure this hap pens.
Activists should propose their organisations affiliate to CDWS, and declare support for a national demonstration.
Such initiatives can run alongside building the conferences and campaign work of the activist-based Welfare State Network, whose highly successful lobby of Parliament is to be followed by a programme of activities in 1995.
Leaders like Edmonds must be pressed to put some concrete into their own rhetoric. We need to see them at the rostrum of this year's Labour Conference moving resolutions to commit a Labour government to a major increase in public spending and common ownership.